This blog offers my strange perspective on the world. Hopefully it will amuse.

Thursday, July 5, 2012

Ennies judge, part 1

This year, I had the unique opportunity to judge for the
Ennies. What are the Ennies? Well, short-version, they are awards to
Role-Playing Game related products that are given annually at Gen Con.

Anyone can run to be a judge, and judges are elected for one
year by the same fans voting on the awards.
The judges’ job is then to read / view all entries and select the
nominations for the Ennies. Those
nominations are then put to fan vote, which decides the winners.

So, long story short (too late), I have had over 300
books/websites/podcasts/etc to read and evaluate since Gen Con of last
year. The vast majority of submissions
were received in April and May, so I’ve been a bit busy!

Though at times I felt overwhelmed by this process (and had
the resultant whining to my friends), overall it has been very gratifying. I wanted to share some things with you, and
also document them for myself.

So why did I get involved in judging?

First, my main goal in this process was to learn more about
Role Playing Games. I play and enjoy
them. I like GMing. But I don’t have a breadth of knowledge about
the games available. Most of my
experience has been with systems that my friends know and enjoy playing. And there is nothing wrong with that. But I like to learn, and I wanted to educate
myself about other systems and basically come to a more holistic understanding
and appreciation for the industry.

Second, I really enjoy reading. I wanted to see what inspired me about
different worlds and settings. I wanted
to learn more about myself through discovering what I gravitated to. I hoped to spark creative thinking within
myself by taking this journey.

Third, I am a girl (duh) in a hobby that is male-dominated. Now, I am not male-bashing. But there are a couple of underlying issues
here.

One, the RPG community tends to be viewed by “outsiders” as
a bunch of nerds without social skills being dorks together. While some of that is true (I’m a nerd and a
dork), there is more to the community – and role-playing – than awkward people
trying to have a good time. [Aside --The
couple who introduced me to role-playing consist of a brilliant, beautiful
woman and perhaps the most socially adept man I’ve ever known. Hard to beat that for non-stereotypical.] So,
being a woman in this hobby, I was hoping that by being a female judge I could
draw attention to some products that might be more female-friendly so to speak. Did I succeed? Who knows.
But it was a thought in my head.

Two, when I applied to be a judge candidate, there were
zero other females who had done so. None. But about 15 guys had applied. Now, a couple of other women applied before
the end, but it really pushed my buttons at the time. I had hesitated about applying, knowing how
much work would be involved – and how seriously I take my commitments. But this basically pushed me over the edge
from “thinking about it” to “okay, do it.”
Does that mean I was the token girl on the judges panel? Probably.
But I will take that and run with it.

So this documents why I decided to apply. And low and behold, I got elected! (And totally yelled “Holy Crap” in a
restaurant full of people in Indianapolis when I found out.)

To be continued with a post about judging itself, and then
eventually discussion of the nominees (which will be announced July 13).

4 comments:

Kat, it was a pleasure having you as a fellow judge. I don't think you were a "token" at all: your input, especially in the latter part of the process, was welcome and helpful, and really had a meaningful part to play in setting the final list of nominees!

You have a lot to be proud of: don't sell yourself short by blaming your success and impact on tokenism!